


Home is Enough

by Fim (damaskino)



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan, The Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan
Genre: Canon Compliant, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, both are miserably stubborn idiots, nico is sometimes an unreliable narrator, plus extrapolation, they deserve each other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-14
Updated: 2014-07-14
Packaged: 2018-02-08 21:01:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,332
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1956000
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/damaskino/pseuds/Fim
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>When you were a child, you fell for a hero.</i>
  <br/>
  <i>It’s ultimately someone else who makes you feel like one.</i>
</p><p> </p><p>2nd person Nico introspection on the book events and beyond.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Home is Enough

**Author's Note:**

> this is self-betaed so i'm sorry if it hurts your eyes

When you were a child, you fell for a hero.

Cold flushes from your heart, through your veins, and settles in the pit of your stomach when you realize that, above the grief and loss and confusion, that’s the reason why you can’t even hate him when it’s his fault your sister isn’t alive anymore. You’re more horrified when you split the earth to protect him, nothing on your mind except _keep him safe, keep him safe, I love—_

So you run.

The walls of the labyrinth freeze the tips of your fingers, but you keep running because you don’t know what else to do. Bianca is gone, and you have no home in this century.

You can’t look at him when he finds you, and you scream when he saves you. You didn’t ask for any of this; you don’t need anything from him that’ll make your feelings more overwhelming. Being around him feels like self-imposed torture, when everything you do for him just shows everyone else how much you don’t belong. In the end, it’s the obsidian walls and the stench of skeletons that make you leave.

 

\---

 

The next time you see him, he doesn’t trust you anymore. Icy hands wrap around your heart when you realize that if Percy Jackson really thought of you as a friend, he would have understood, _you didn’t mean it_ and you were desperate and you never wanted to hurt him. But in reality, you’ve been losing his trust ever since he found out who your father was. You lost everyone else’s when they saw the awful, terrible things you can do.

Victory, in the end, feels hollow. You make your home surrounded by cold, black walls and flames that aren’t hot, but it still doesn’t feel like home, not really.

You’re barely a teenager, and you’ve already forgotten what it’s like to feel warm.

 

\---

 

You practice shadow-traveling in your spare time (which is only a half-truth, because really you just can’t stand staying in one place too long), and you go to Central Park on a whim. Resentment is an ugly feeling that grips you when you see people walking their dogs and feeding pigeons, because the only animals that will go near you are the ones that smell like death themselves.

But then again, there are so many things about you that make people instinctively keep away that you’re never sure which it is anymore.

You hate, hate, _hate_ it.

 

\---

 

Time turns hatred into quiet resignation. Years later, you find Hazel, and she makes you happy in ways that no one has since you lost Bianca. Sometimes you don’t know how to deal with it. You’re afraid that eventually she’ll see whatever it is in you that makes people look at you like you’ve got thoughts of murder on your mind, so you bring her to Camp Jupiter.

Reyna is stern and intelligent and Jason stares at you like he wants to ask more questions, but neither treat you or your sister any differently than if you were simply children of Apollo or Venus. You deem them competent enough to look after Hazel, so when you see the way she and the son of Mars look at each other, you leave because your place isn’t here.

The blond praetor still looks like he wants to say something when he watches you go, but you tell yourself it’s probably nothing you want to hear anyway.

 

\---

 

When Percy Jackson disappears from Camp Halfblood and an amnesic Jason Grace ends up in  his place, you are shocked to find him in Camp Jupiter. Something big’s happening and you couldn’t run from it if you tried, but it still shakes you when Percy looks at you with no emotion at all. At least when he was looking at you with suspicion in his eyes, it was _something_. You don’t stay to watch him charm the rest of the people here, because you have more important things to do. It has nothing to do with how frustrated you are at your own feelings.

 

\---

 

Tartarus plunges you into fire and cuts up your skin with jagged stone, but none of that compares to images it burns into your mind.

You see Bianca, dying, and coming back to sneer at your own weakness. You tell yourself _no, that’s not true, I talked to her and she doesn’t hate me like that_ , but her voice taunts you for so long that you finally can’t remember what reality is anymore.

You see Percy, who will never love you, leaving you to die here while he saves the world but never spares another glance for you.

You see every single person you’ve let down in your life and their voices fill your head, spiteful and mistrusting.

_“You don’t belong with us.”_

_“You’re a freak!”_

_“No one will care if you die.”_

_“If they do, it’s just because they can use you.”_

They start to feel less like lies and more like memories.

_“You’re worthless, and you don’t deserve to be loved.”_

_“You’ll always be alone, forever.”_

You believe them.

 

\---

 

The suffocation of the giants’ jar is almost relief because here, at least, is silence.

 

\---

 

Percy saves you again, but you don’t get the chance to be bitter about it before Tartarus takes him too.

At least he has Annabeth with him. They look at each other like don’t need anyone else to depend on, and that only makes it hurt more when no one on this ship except Hazel looks at you with anything resembling trust.

You should be used to it by now, so you’re just frustrated by how much it bothers you.

 

\---

 

Cupid strips you bare and tears your heart out for the son of Jupiter to see, and you’re so furious and ashamed that you couldn’t even suppress this, and now it’s out there, this is just one more reason for people to treat you with disdain. You half expect Jason to freeze up and throw insults at you, but he just looks at you with pity and understanding. And somehow that makes it worse, because you don’t _want_ that. You don’t know what to do with it and you don’t want him to keep talking, so you wrap yourself in prickly anger until he stops trying.

He does, but only until he gets you alone again.

“Just be yourself,” he tells you, and you almost want to laugh at how ignorant he is. _Jason_ is made of gold, the leader, the proud son. No one has wanted _you_ , the son of Hades, to be yourself for as long as you can remember. They would probably be happier if you just ceased to exist.

You’re livid. You want him to leave you alone. Jason is too bright and it hurts your eyes.

He tells you to trust him, but you know that trust is dangerous from the last time you tried it out. It’s a ridiculous demand in the first place; you barely know each other, and you’re certainly not friends. You want to scream, _why should I trust you when you’ve never trusted me?_

 

\---

 

All you have to offer him is poison, but he takes it without hesitating and stares at you intently while he drinks it.

This time his eyes say _I trust you_ , and it’s the first time anyone has willingly made themselves vulnerable in front of you.

 _Why?_ You stare back. You think he’s stupid and stubborn, and he’ll lose interest in his pity project soon enough.

Jason keeps trying to prove that he’s your friend, and you’ve tested his limits and you haven’t found any bounds so far. He’s shoved his way into your life against all your protesting.

So you leave.

You don’t intend to come back.

 

\---

 

Jason sees you trying to walk away after the war is won though, and he doesn’t let you.

“No one wants me here,” you tell him with a glare. “I don’t belong with a group of heroes.”

“That’s not true,” he says, tugging on your arm and rooting you in place. “You helped just as much as any of us, and we all want you here. I want you here.”

You stare at him incredulously, because _is this guy for real_? “No, you don’t. You don’t even know me. I don’t belong anywhere. I don’t even belong in this _century_.”

“I don’t care about that.”

You bristle and try to yank your arm from his grasp, but he doesn’t budge. “You _should_! Why are you wasting your time here, anyway? Just go back to your friends. Must be depressing for you to spend so much time around me.”

Jason looks sad. “They’re your friends too, you know.”

You let him lead you back into camp, and you tell yourself it’s because fighting him to get away wouldn’t be worth it.

 

\---

 

He coerces you into a restlessly comfortable routine, asking you to stay at Camp Half Blood like you belong there. You draw the line at teaching new campers how to spar, though (he drags you out to train with him anyway). He eats at your table and makes you come to as many activities as he can get you to participate in. One day he asks you to teach him Mythomagic, and you can’t figure out his motivations but you do it anyway because you don’t have anything better to do.

He’s already got cards and figurines that he said borrowed from Frank, and his face lights up when you start explaining the game to him.

You can’t take it anymore.

“Why do you even care so much?”

Jason looks confused. “About Mythomagic?”

“About me!” You set your cards down and get to your feet. “I’m a _freak_ ,” you spit, echoing the words you know so well, “and you shouldn’t even want to be here. I don’t know why you’re so hell-bent on fixing me, but you’re not gaining anything from this at all. So _why?_ ”

“Because I like you,” he says without missing a beat, still sitting calmly. “You’re not a freak, and I’m not trying to fix you. I just want to be your friend.”

He sounds sincere, and when you realize that you’re devastated. Because he shouldn’t care. He _can’t_ care, because then you’ll start to care, and that’s ended well for you all of zero times. The fight is drained out of you, and you kneel back down before you have to deal with him physically getting up to make you stay.

“…You’re holding your cards upside-down.”

Jason doesn’t seem to mind the abrupt subject change, and he gives you a smile that makes you wonder how long it’ll take you to fall this time.

 

\---

 

Eventually seeing Percy with Annabeth becomes only a dull ache, and it scares you. You know how to deal with Percy; you’ve been doing it for years. But you have no idea how to deal with Jason. Not when he’s around every corner, waiting for you with welcoming arms and easy grins that you don’t know the meaning of.

Sometimes his smiles are so fond that you start think maybe—

No, that’s impossible. You’ve just been starved for so long that you think that anyone showing you kindness actually means something, and you’re disgusted that the thought even crossed your mind. People like you aren’t supposed to matter to people like Jason. Jason burns bright and draws people to him, but you’re going to be alone forever. You thought you had reconciled with that fact a long time ago.

 

\---

 

There is one time that Jason comes back to camp after a talk with his father and Juno, drained and frustrated and only giving short greetings to anyone who tries to talk to him. You weren’t waiting for him, but he sees you hovering by your cabin door on his way to his and walks toward you.

“Nico,” he says, voice strained, and he lurches forward to wrap you in a tight hug.

“Hey,” you reply, muffled against his T-shirt.

Jason relaxes after a few seconds. “Sorry, I—”

“It’s okay,” you say, because Jason’s talked about this before and you get it. You know what it’s like to stand in front of someone and struggle to meet their expectations, so you lay a hand on his back and let him cling to you in silence, selfishly letting the moment last longer.

“Thanks,” he says after a while, and when he stands straight again it’s like he’s cast off some of the weight on his shoulders. The look he gives you this time is grateful and earnest, but you wonder if you aren’t seeing something else there too.

Jason makes you second-guess yourself, and this feeling is hauntingly familiar.

You’re terrified, so you leave the next day.

 

\---

 

Your father isn’t exactly happy to see you, but he doesn’t scorn you either and it’s a relief to just be around a person you know how to handle. The Lord of the Underworld won’t ever win any parenting awards, but he accepts you now and you’ll take what you can get.

But you’ve spent so much time above ground in the past year that you start missing the sun before long. You ask Hades for the names and locations of monsters he’s been meaning to herd back to Tartarus, and you set out alone.

 

\---

 

It’s an awful idea.

You aren’t overwhelmed by the number of monsters in the area, but they’re quick and sneaky and there’s only one of you. They don’t let you look away, and you’ve got no one watching your back. It exhausts you and you try to look around for an alcove or a shelter to make an escape into, but the moment your turn your head, pain erupts in your left shoulder where a monster rakes its claws through it. You stagger and hold back a scream to turn back towards the monster, but then you see a gold blade stuck through its head.

The monster shrieks as it disintegrates, and suddenly Jason is there, all stormy eyes and golden, windblown hair. He summons lightening onto the remaining monsters and you create one last fissure in the ground before he rounds on you, furious.

“What were you _thinking_?” he yells, grabbing you by the collar and pulling you towards him. “You don’t hunt these things alone! Are you trying to get yourself killed?!”

The expression on Jason’s face makes him look as if he’s the one who’d gotten injured, and you realize that he’s seriously asking. But you hate it when Jason worries about you, and you really aren’t trying to die. “I’m not—no,” you stutter, because he’s still the last person you expected to see here. “I’m fine. I could have killed them.” With difficulty, maybe, but it would take more than errant spirits to kill you.

Jason looks marginally relieved, and more exasperated than angry. “You got hurt though,” he insists, pulling your jacket to the side to look at your shoulder.

You wince. “It’s not that bad.”

He sighs. “Let’s get you healed up, okay? Back at camp.”

You shrug your right shoulder and let him fuss over you. He picks you up bridal-style before taking off into the sky, and you don’t complain only because you’re tired and you don’t want to argue with him when he’s like this.

 

\---

 

It’s not a deep wound, but it still takes a few days to heal and Jason keeps a careful watch over you in that time.

“What were you doing there, anyway?” You ask him while he changes your bandages.

“Looking for you,” he says simply.

“How did you know where I was?”

He shrugged. “I asked Hazel. She pointed me towards a general direction, so I flew around until I found you.”

You raise an eyebrow at him. “And you just happened to find me in the middle of nowhere?”

“It took a few days.”

You sit in silence for a moment, watching him finishing up and throwing out the old bandages. He notices you staring at him and sits, waiting for you to talk.

“Why aren’t you afraid of me?” you ask finally, because that’s what confuses you the most. Literally everyone except for your father is wary of you, tiptoeing around you if not avoiding you completely.

Jason’s face drops, and you can’t read a single expression on it. “…I am afraid,” he says.

“Then why—”

“I’m afraid that you’re going to leave, and never come back. That you’re going to hide forever or go out and get yourself killed, and I’ll never see you again.”

“I don’t understand why you even care.”

“You don’t understand why I’d care if you died?”

You nod with a wry smile. “What difference does it make to you? Everyone loves you. You don’t need me. You literally have no reason to keep me around.”

 _“Nico_.”

“Isn’t it true?”

Jason sighs and runs his fingers through his hair. “Look. I don’t know who said something to you to make you think that you’re not worth anything—”

“That’s not—”

“No, let me finish. You’re right, I don’t need you. We’re not at war anymore, and I don’t want to use you, anyway. But…” he looks straight at you, and your breath hitches. “…when I said I liked you, I meant it. Okay?”

 _It’s not okay._ This isn’t fair. He can’t just say things like this when he has no idea what it does to you; when you know you don’t actually mean anything to him.

You get up angrily. “You don’t mean it.”

He looks affronted. “I do like you—”

“No, you don’t!” Your chest constricts and your voice feels unsteady. “Not the way I—” You freeze, catching yourself and forcing yourself to calm down. Among the worst things you could possibly say to him at this moment, your stupid, stupid feelings fall somewhere in the top three. “Just…leave me alone, okay?” you say in a small voice. You won’t let yourself cry in front of him. He’s shouldered enough of your weakness for a lifetime already. “It’s easier for everyone that way.”

You block out his protests and turn to leave, but all of a sudden you feel yourself being spun around and a warm hand wraps around the back of your neck.

“You aren’t _listening_ to me,” Jason frowns and moves his face so close to yours that he’s the only thing that fills your vision. “You’re important to me. I don’t care who your father is, or what kind of powers you have. I want you here with me, and I never want to see you leave again. I’ve never _meant_ anything more in my life.”

And then he leans forward and presses his lips to yours, so careful and gentle that it barely feels like a kiss at all. And finally, finally your tears start to flow, because he has no business unearthing all your insecurities and healing every one.

But he’s doing it anyway.

 

\---

 

You might regret this one day. Jason could leave you, and you’ll lose him in the same way you never got to keep any of the other good things in your life. You’ve never been the hero. You’re not the one who gets the happy ending.

But sometimes, he looks at you like you’re the only constant he needs to lean on. Like you’re it for him as much as he’s it for you. He smiles at you like he’s made up his mind, and you know from hard-earned experience that he’s the most stubborn person on this side of the century. So when you start to let him, Jason moves heaven and earth to prove the voices in your head wrong.

His arms are warm and secure around you, and when he kisses your cheek it makes you think of _home._ He touches his forehead to yours when you stare up at him, and you think,

_ah._

_So this is what it feels like._

**Author's Note:**

> plz come say hi on [tumblr](http://fimyuan.tumblr.com) and let’s talk about how this ship has ruined all of us


End file.
